1. Technical Field
This disclosure relates to an image forming apparatus and an image forming method, and more specifically to an image forming apparatus and method of forming an image on a print medium having an adhesive face.
2. Description of the Related Art
Image forming apparatuses are used as printers, facsimile machines, copiers, plotters, or multi-functional devices having, e.g., two or more of the foregoing capabilities. As one type of image forming apparatuses, for example, an image forming apparatus, such as a label printer, is known that prints a print medium having an adhesive face with no separation sheet mounted thereon, such as a label sheet having no tape or mount sheet, (hereinafter, also referred to as “linerless label sheet”) and cuts the print medium to a desired length after printing to form a print medium piece (hereinafter, “label piece”).
For such an image forming apparatus, an adhesive face of the label piece is exposed after cutting. As a result, the label piece may be adhered to another label piece or an operator's hand or cloth, thus resulting in a reduced adhesion or an unavailable defective label.
Hence, a stacker apparatus like that described in JP-2003-146318-A is proposed for adhesive labels having no mounts. The adhesive label has a separation-processed print portion on the front face side and an adhesive portion on the back face side. The stacker apparatus includes a cutter section for cutting the adhesive label into label pieces, a conveyance section to convey the label pieces cut by the cutter section, a cylindrical rotary member rotatably disposed at a downstream side of the conveyance section to rotate while temporality adhering the label pieces discharged from a conveyance means to an outer surface of the rotary member, and a biasing means to urge the label pieces discharged from the conveyance section, from the front face side toward the rotary member.
Alternatively, another stacker device like that described in JP-2004-059310-A is proposed for adhesive labels having no mounts. The stacker device includes a conveyance means for conveying and discharging a label piece cut at a cutter portion and a label receiving stand portion having a disk-like rotation member that is placed rotatably and substantially in a horizontal state on a downstream side of the conveyance means and that rotates while making the label piece discharged from the conveyance means temporarily stick on its non-adhesive processed surface.
However, for such a configuration described in JP-2003-146318-A or JP-2004-059310-A, label pieces discharged are (temporarily) adhered to a rotary (rotation) member and stacked on the rotary member. The inventors have recognized that such a configuration results in an increased size of the apparatus. In addition, since label pieces are once adhered to another member (rotary member), the adhesive force of label pieces is reduced.